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| ▲ | oersted1234 2 days ago | parent | next [-] | | Most UK universities place a lot of value on teaching experience. If you have a PhD degree from Cambridge or Oxford, a decent publication track record and significant teaching experience, you will typically get lectureship (assistant professor) offers straight after you finish your doctoral studies. Some teaching experience will be valued more than having a stellar publication record, especially if you have a good research plan. It makes sense because most lectureships involve at least 40% of teaching and supervision. Going back to the main topic of this post, using too many underpaid academics to teach creates some perverse incentives that are IMHO destroying Oxbridge. Many professors are no longer teaching. Teaching is a great filter. It makes sure they stay up-to-date, they are technically good and they take pride in their research field. Professors that are really good and passionate, i.e. Terry Tao-like personalities, are often getting displaced by ladder climbers. This is especially common in experimental fields and really disheartening. | | |
| ▲ | YeGoblynQueenne 2 days ago | parent [-] | | It depends on what kind of academic work you're looking for, right? If you're going for a teaching career, then yes, of course you need to have some teaching experience. If you're after a research career, e.g. a research fellowship like the ones from the Leverhulme Trust or the Royal Society of Engineering, then you really do need an astounding publication record and I don't reckon that having any teaching experience is going to help you with that. Not least because in academia, either you teach, or you do research. You can't do both. >> Teaching is a great filter. It makes sure they stay up-to-date, they are technically good and they take pride in their research field. If that's your experience, that must be something that depends on the field of research and we must be in different fields. In CS, teaching is indeed a good filter- in the sense that it separates the teachers from the researchers. I have the direct experience of my PI, who has not done a day of research after becoming a lecturer. Because there is no time. Teaching takes so much admin work that there's no time left for research. I mean any above-junior academic position takes too much admin work, but teaching really gets the cookie. My experience so far has been that senior academics who still take an active role in research find ways to avoid teaching like the plague. Although you can't really escape it. You'll at least mark some papers in your subject, whether you like it or not (and with TA-ing from PhDs or not). | | |
| ▲ | oersted1234 2 days ago | parent | next [-] | | IMHO, this also applies if you want a research career. At the end of the day, you eventually need a permanent position. Most professors at top UK universities got established in Academia by doing a PhD and getting a lectureship straight after their PhD or sometimes a postdoc. Lectureships demand significant research and teaching and supervision experience. A high-end fellowship like the ones you mention is also fine if you want to improve your publication track record. In some fields getting a lectureship after your PhD or postdoc might be extremely difficult as the market is too crowded. | | |
| ▲ | YeGoblynQueenne a day ago | parent [-] | | >> At the end of the day, you eventually need a permanent position Yes, unfortunately. I'm not saying it's easy, but from what I can tell it's possible: you can have your entire academic career as a long string of fellowships. >> Lectureships demand significant research and teaching and supervision experience. Yes, but we know that in practice what that means is that the professor leaves the research work to their PhDs and post-docs, and then puts their name on it at the end. Sometimes that's because the professor has run out of good ideas, sometimes it's because they don't really care, most of the time it's because their lectureship duties leave them without enough time to do it. This was not my experience during my PhD, btw, my supervisor (who is retiring next month, three years after supervising my PhD) was an active participant in my research and he had his own totally hands-on line of research that he pursued separately ... and whenever I told people about that they were full of surprise. "Don't tell me that he is still coding?". That sort of thing. People were surprised because that just doesn't happen. >> In some fields getting a lectureship after your PhD or postdoc might be extremely difficult as the market is too crowded. I've had an offer that I turned down because it was in China, and a discussion about another in the UK that I didn't even consider. Teaching is the death of a research career, that's what I've seen and I'm not going anywhere near it. What that means I don't know. It's possible that my research career is already over anyway- next week is the last of my post-doc and I don't have anything lined up after it :/ |
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| ▲ | mkl 2 days ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | > Not least because in academia, either you teach, or you do research. You can't do both. This is not true in general. In NZ, most academic positions are 40% research, 40% teaching, and 20% admin. Lecturers, distinguished professors, and everyone in between. Big research grants can provide temporary buy-out of some teaching, but it's explicitly part of the role, and not often reduced completely for long. Maybe 10% of academic roles at my university don't include research. | | |
| ▲ | oersted1234 2 days ago | parent | next [-] | | Yes, I don't understand that point either as all UK Lecturer job positions I have interviewed for (quite a few!) required at least 40% of teaching. A 40% teaching is the most research-intensive contract you can get at most universities. Good departments will still let you enjoy a sane workload because they will allocate a realistic amount of that 40% for teaching preparation, marking duties, etc. | | |
| ▲ | YeGoblynQueenne a day ago | parent [-] | | Well, lectureships are teaching jobs, not research jobs, that's my point. I don't think it has anything to do with the department, if you sign a contract that says you have to teach, you're gonna have to teach, however much of your time it takes- and it is going to take up most of your time. Anyway from my point of view, any amount of time you spend on not doing research is a mallus on your productivity as a researcher. I mean that's why most mid-level and senior academics leave the research to their PhD students and post-docs. Yes? Because they don't have the time to do it themselves. |
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| ▲ | a day ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | [deleted] | |
| ▲ | YeGoblynQueenne a day ago | parent | prev [-] | | I see what you're saying, but 60% of time spent doing something else than research, is not a research position. That is no way to be productive as a researcher. The upshot of this is what I point out in my other comments, that you end up offloading the research work to PhDs and post-docs while you take the back seat and of course keep the funds coming so that they can do their job. ... although my PI didn't :) |
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| ▲ | JumpCrisscross 2 days ago | parent | prev [-] | | > depends on what kind of academic work you're looking for, right? It depends on where you are. British universities value teaching more than American ones, which are more focussed on research. | | |
| ▲ | YeGoblynQueenne a day ago | parent [-] | | I didn't know that, thanks. The article and the OP are about the situation in UK universities. |
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| ▲ | notahacker 2 days ago | parent | prev [-] | | And different academic jobs can be mostly research or mostly teaching |
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